THEODORE WIRTH REGIONAL PARK

The Twin Cities' largest park has everything you need for a day outside, from golf courses and hiking trails to bogs and wildflower gardens.

Image by Todd Buchanan/Greenspring Media

Theodore Wirth Regional Park isn’t only the largest park in the Minneapolis park system (about the same size as Central Park in New York), but it also has one of the most unique features of any of the parks on our list. Its focal point is not its miles and miles of wooded hiking and biking trials (though they are beautiful and should not be discounted), it is the Quaking Bog. A bog is an area of land that drains poorly, and as a result, the ground has a wet and spongy feel to it (like you are walking on a water bed) and is full of accumulated plant material. In fact, the Quaking Bog is so spongy that you need to use floating boardwalks to journey through it. And it is a journey worth taking. With the Eloise Butler Wildflower Garden and Bird Sanctuary, the area is home to an abundance of wildlife and plant species that will make you feel like you are lost in the wilderness instead of nestled in nature on the outside edges of Minneapolis. Theodore Wirth Regional Park also features two golf courses, archery, disc golf, a tennis court, soccer field, fishing pier and more.